In my view yes, and with that in mind I will amend the definition of a shuttle shortly so please check the main post in about 30 minutes for the update. I think it's just always been assumed that more than one engine will be required to get a shuttle, main tank and cargo to orbit, but I'm sure you will be able to prove that that's not the case

SM

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To my shame, I have never attempted the STS Challenge before, despite having built 3 (I think) incarnations of a NASA-like Space Shuttle. The first one used the old Mk3 parts and I had it just about perfected when Squad binned them and brought in the new set!

Anyway, here's this evening's shakedown run. I've got a few visual/info mods installed tho I haven't actually used any of them (apart from anything Mechjeb can't fly my shuttle!). If I'm infringing any rules fair enough, but I thought it might just net me the STS1 Commander badge!

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Because I finished the station, and asteroids are stil broken (I checked, the A-class stil weighs 150 t), I decided to try the bonus mission with the fuel pod. I managed to put it in a 350x350 orbit with plenty of fuel left.

*Gallery Snip*

This challenge was great, and me and my crew are really looking forward to more missions, if they eventually come (or the asteroids are fixed). Thanks for the challenge, Speeding Mullet, and I hope to hear from you soon with more awesome missions to do with Kolumbia

Michal.don

Nice work and at 350km exactly that places you second place on the modded leaderboard! Yep the asteroids are definitely broken I will address that shortly. I'm really glad you are enjoying the challenge, and look forward to seeing further challenge entries from you once I get more put into the main thread! Here's your badge

On 5/23/2016 at 0:03 PM, The_Rocketeer said:

To my shame, I have never attempted the STS Challenge before, despite having built 3 (I think) incarnations of a NASA-like Space Shuttle. The first one used the old Mk3 parts and I had it just about perfected when Squad binned them and brought in the new set!

Anyway, here's this evening's shakedown run. I've got a few visual/info mods installed tho I haven't actually used any of them (apart from anything Mechjeb can't fly my shuttle!). If I'm infringing any rules fair enough, but I thought it might just net me the STS1 Commander badge!

*Gallery Snip*

Yep that'll do it! Luckily my shuttle has survived a few iterations of KSP without major damage. They are a pain to get right! Although you haven't screen shotted your final orbit I can tell from the orbital velocity that you have filled the requirements to bring a shuttle to LKO so here's your badge - Hope to see you completing more challenges!

On 5/23/2016 at 5:56 AM, funk said:

The HST mission shows why prelaunch training for astronauts is so important... Where is up? Where down? Where is my target? And first and foremost where is the shuttle?

It took me some time to get used to the jetpack behaviour, but with fine controls it's really fun, and like the HST itself is giving us wonderful pictures, the mission is kinda eye-catching, too.

Spoiler alert: Funkyndustries' engineers remembered some blueprints and prototypes of 1.04. They started to improve the design of an alternative Space Transport System...

*Gallery Snip*

Very nice mission indeed funk! I'm using similar visual mods to you and it really makes these shuttle missions look spectacular, very eye-catching as you say. Loved the HST mission personally. Anyway, badge-ho!

EDIT: @funk how could I not comment on that (?) SSTO lifting your shuttle to orbit. That's pretty intense stuff. Like STS-100 tough. Which gives me an idea for a very late on mission that you might pre-qualify for!

On 5/23/2016 at 9:47 AM, Dman Revolution said:

I don't know if this counts, because I don't have picks of the full launch, but here's my STS-1 mission with my Aries Orbiter

I had a bunch of fuel left, so I could've gone a bit higher

*Gallery Snip*

Hi there welcome to the challenge! I'm going to have to ask for a more comprehensive gallery I'm afraid. I'm pretty sure you won't have developed a working shuttle just for it to site in your file system so next time you run a mission do you want to take a few more screenies and put them together for a challenge/mission report? Hope you understand - Just have to keep everyone by the same rules!

Right - In other news it appears that the potatoes still aren't fixed. I'm going to be providing a much needed update to the challenge to push back potato landing to a later mission. Hopefully I will be able to crank this out soon but if it's the weekend then please do bear with me as work is pretty crazy at the moment!

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Well, I was going to do it until I found someone already did the Saturn version. Now i'm all out of interesting ideas.

Also, need some clarification. The rules say that boosters can be attached radially to the carrier. Does that mean I can't have multiple inline stages on the carrier. Sometimes the first stage of a rocket is referred to as a booster stage with booster engines and a second stage would have abstainer engines.

(If the album hasn't updated on here then click on it, I just replaced the old with the new)

BOOM! Nice work and straight to the second spot on the stock leader-board with a height of 804.69km bumping @Gaarst from 5th place (sorry Gaarst ). Well done on the highly accurate orbit that's well within the requirements for the flight directors badge which you can collect here:

As this is your first mission you also get Mission Commander - Rank 1 Very detailed shuttle and looks really capable so look forward to seeing you progress through the mission profiles!!

3 hours ago, macktruck6666 said:

Well, I was going to do it until I found someone already did the Saturn version. Now i'm all out of interesting ideas.

Also, need some clarification. The rules say that boosters can be attached radially to the carrier. Does that mean I can't have multiple inline stages on the carrier. Sometimes the first stage of a rocket is referred to as a booster stage with booster engines and a second stage would have abstainer engines.

It doesn't matter at all - you can see how many people have gone for the traditional shuttle or buran version, so there's absolutely no reason why you can't do a Saturn Shuttle also . I've experimented with a few different designs though such as:

Screamchaser (made this a long time ago and it doesn't qualify for the challenge as no cargo bay)

Buran 11F-35 Kerbal B (my actual main use shuttle and very very capable having completed all Shuttle challenges)

There are many many more shuttle designs that you can go for if you really don't want to do the same thing as someone else, but in short it doesn;t matter - your craft will still be unique to you and then fun is in completing challenges and engineering an awesome vehicle so dive in and have a go

To answer your actual question:

3 hours ago, macktruck6666 said:

The rules say that boosters can be attached radially to the carrier. Does that mean I can't have multiple inline stages on the carrier. Sometimes the first stage of a rocket is referred to as a booster stage with booster engines and a second stage would have abstainer engines.

I'm comfortable with having a staged carrier vehicle. @ZooNamedGamesset precedent here with as it happens the Saturn Shuttle that was entered into the challenge. I think the spirit of the rule is to keep the shuttle itself fairly traditional, but how you get it to space (as long as it conforms to the rules) is very much up for you and open to reasonable interpretation. In the old shuttle challenge @Evanitis really took this to extremes with the Space Husttle and Maimed Duck.

If ever you are not sure feel free to ask for clarification or ruling, post a couple of pictures, open up a discussion or just shoot and hope you aren't breaking the rules

Thanks

HG

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BOOM! Nice work and straight to the second spot on the stock leader-board with a height of 804.69km bumping @Gaarst from 5th place (sorry Gaarst ). Well done on the highly accurate orbit that's well within the requirements for the flight directors badge which you can collect here:

Just wait 'til I get back in business when VAB crashes will be fixed !

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Seriously- I've played with RSS/RO and the normal game with mods and the VAB has never crashed for me in 1.1.2. Idk what you do to crash it.

Therein lies the problem. KSP 1.1.x is stable for some, crash-happy for others, and won't even start for others, and nobody knows why. Though multithreading-related race conditions are always a suspect for that kind of bug, and on Linux there's probably a compatibility issue with some driver or system library.

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OK, I still have to add RCS and tweak couple more things and then make a proper mission report, but I made a total overkill.

It got beyond Mun's orbit (almost ran into the Mun), circularized, deorbited, aerobraked in couple passes (lost RTGs inside the cargo bay...) reentered and landed at KSC... with this thing in the bay...

One hell of a first orbital flight for a shuttle. Also it's a very nice balancing thing to have the ability to pump the fuel along the vehicle

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In lieu of the potato mission not really being feasible at the moment (unless anyone wants to land a 150t rock?) I've released a new mission to take the place of STS-9 Can You Land Me. Can You Land Me will slip down the order until the roids are fixed and then it will become STS-however far along we are at that moment! Enjoy the new mission folks, looking forward to seeing how people overcome this challenge for sure. I foresee some design iterations on the way!

19 hours ago, Gaarst said:

Just wait 'til I get back in business when VAB crashes will be fixed !

Can't wait to see what you have planned!! Sucks that your game is crashy. Perfectly stable here and heavily modded so yeah that's not cool. Hopefully the next patch fixes this along with the roids!

11 hours ago, Alchemist said:

OK, I still have to add RCS and tweak couple more things and then make a proper mission report, but I made a total overkill.

You might like to check out the new STS-9 mission I've just released. It could play into the hands of this (epic) new shuttle very nicely! Also it looks like I'm going to have to work out something on the Fuel pod mission, maybe introducing it again into a later challenge. The fuel pod is part of the woodwork for three challenges now so it should pop up in some of the harder missions maybe...

Look forward to seeing your mission report!

SM

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New mission, oh yes!!!! I have a question regarding the rules of this one though - Is refueling in LKO permitted, or does the shuttle have to deliver the outpost using just the fuel it starts with on the launchpad? Because I'm afraid if that's the case, Kolumbia isn't able to do this, and I'll have to design a new shuttle.

Hmm, good question. I think that it would be nice to allow a maximum of 1 support launch for this mission (that doesn't have to be a shuttle launch). You can choose to make that a simple re-fueling mission, or you can use it as an opportunity to launch a dockable booster pack to see your shuttle on it's way, add drop tanks to the shuttle, or create a large interplanetary living complex and multi module mission pack for the journey to or from Duna. As long as the Shuttle isn't just dead weight, delivers the payload and returns successfully then I don't have an issue with that I don't think.

What does everyone reckon? 1 support launch allowed or not?

EDIT: Or even just say support launches allowed? I'm really wanting to avoid limiting creativity but am also conscious of keeping the challenges in the spirit and flow of the thread....

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In lieu of the potato mission not really being feasible at the moment (unless anyone wants to land a 150t rock?) I've released a new mission to take the place of STS-9 Can You Land Me. Can You Land Me will slip down the order until the roids are fixed and then it will become STS-however far along we are at that moment! Enjoy the new mission folks, looking forward to seeing how people overcome this challenge for sure. I foresee some design iterations on the way!

Can't wait to see what you have planned!! Sucks that your game is crashy. Perfectly stable here and heavily modded so yeah that's not cool. Hopefully the next patch fixes this along with the roids!

I strongly protest against the removal of this mission. The reason I RQ'd KSP at the moment were the dozens (22 when I gave up) of crashes I experienced while designing a shuttle able to land a 150t rock... this and also the fact that my craft file ended up corrupted which almost made me throw my computer out the window from the fifth floor.

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Well, I decided to experiment with HRO-M and the payload a bit...
(HRO stands for Heavy Recovery Orbiter... now you'll see why)

Getting the payload up there is not a problem for this craft... Actually, for such altitudes the further you get the cheaper it gets.

The precision of orbit deployment (I used kOS to make the info screen, piloting was 100% manual) is a few kilometers - looks like 0.02-0.03 m/s velocity error is as close as you can get, since it oscillates and drifts with this kind of magnitude.

The only issue was with the RCS ports burning up - replaced with the proper ones before the next launch.

But then there was the second part of the mission...

Recovering the tank? Done! but next time somebody tries it, don't forget proper panels. Decie had to get out and use her head couple times.

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I strongly protest against the removal of this mission. The reason I RQ'd KSP at the moment were the dozens (22 when I gave up) of crashes I experienced while designing a shuttle able to land a 150t rock... this and also the fact that my craft file ended up corrupted which almost made me throw my computer out the window from the fifth floor.

I will land this thing... whenever Squad decides to fix this.

I haven't take the challenge out, I just thought that asteroids were 150t regardless of having being mined or not and thought that the mission wasn't very feasible as a result so parked the mission until the problem was resolved.

As Alchemist has subsequently proved the mission is actually entirely doable so in fact the mission will be re-instated shortly . Sucks that you're RQ bound with KSP, I do hope it get's sorted quickly for people experiencing heavy crashing. I was but then I worked out that I a) hadn't put the 64 bit installation in the right tree, and b) CKAN wasn't using the 64 bit starter. I just do it manually now and haven't had a crash since. but I don't think that's the same problem that you are describing unfortunately

On 5/27/2016 at 6:04 AM, Alchemist said:

I think I burned myself out a bit with this one, but it was totally worth it...

*Gallery Snip*

Intercepted in Kerbin SOI, mined out of ore and brought to KSC for research... poor rock.

16,5 t of mined out rock and a bunch of extracted fuel in the tanks. And surprisingly nothing melted on the ship with such aerobraking

As above I though that the asteroid issue was that they were 150t regardless of being mined or not. Thanks for showing that this is not the case and giving me cause to re-instate the asteroid challenge! What a mission too. it looks like you were running on the very edge of heat tolerance on re-entry. Here's your badge. You are now the highest achieving pilot the Shuttle Challenge has ever seen

Also well done recovering the 42t payload from orbit, that's quite the achievement. I've seen it done before once, but this is pretty cool none the less. I don't think it will form part of a future challenge but it definitely goes to show your shuttle is hugely capable. I think this is the one that you will have to do the interplanetary mission with!

Speaking of the Duna mission I'll update the badges for it shortly!

SM

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This landing was totally on the edge of the gliding capacity, but given there was twice the mass of the rock in the ship's tanks, the rock could have been heavier... at least if that doesn't throw the balance off completely... maybe around 30 tons is possible...

One of the reasons for getting as much fuel as possible was exactly that that I was completely unsure if aerobraking like this would be even possible or if it would require slowing down by a few hundreds m/s first with engines. It barely sheds couple hundreds m/s on first pass with ~40 km periapsis while almost melting the entire vessel

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So I made the mistake of deciding to go the video route. Even with some parts being sped up to 7x, the thing is still 37 minutes long! Feel free to skip around a bit. I added a few annotations here and there. This is only the shuttle to orbit and back to KSC for now. I have some tweaks to do to a few things, I decided to go hard mode-ish. I used a few mods... even disallowed ones! But for honest purposes, honest! If in your infinite wisdom and unfathomable grace you decide that these nullify my entry, I suppose I will redo it from scratch. But not in video form again.

Final Apoapsis: 445,361m

Orbiter:
Skuttle IV
- Sanrec Kerman
- Billan Kerman
- Neilgard Kerman

Carrier: Esper 412-C "Snoopy"
- Bilbus Kerman

All Mods Installed (Whether used or not):

Spoiler

-Environmental Visual Enhancements: Visuals only. No gameplay changes
-Kerbal Attachment System: Used for struts, links, winches, and magnets during the mission
-Kerbal Engineer: Used for technical information
-Hyper Edit: Not used for STS mission, previously used to place "permanent" ground based radio relay structures.
-Kerbal Inventory System: Not used for STS Mission.
-Infernal Robotics: Used for hinges on Shuttle Mounting rig.
-Mech Jeb: Not used for STS Mission.
-Planetary Base: Used in the shuttle cargo bay, no effect on this STS mission.
-Planet Shine: Visuals only. No gameplay changes.
-Quantum Struts: Not used for STS Mission.
-Remote Tech: Not used for STS Mission.
-Texture Replacer: Visuals only. No gameplay changes.
-TAC Life Support: Not used for STS Mission. Out of date and not working anyway.
-Kerbal Alarm Clock: Not used for STS Mission.
-Tweak Scale: Used on nose cone for shuttle carrier aircraft, counter weights on shuttle mounting rig, and shield plate on shuttle launch crawler.